


Labor and Delivery (PT:2)

by missditsydarcy



Series: "Autumn Child" Verse OneShots [5]
Category: Free!
Genre: M/M, i have been waiting forever for you guys to meet her!! <3, implied makoharu, tw: child birth, tw: labor, welcome baby yamazaki!!
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-21
Updated: 2020-02-21
Packaged: 2021-02-27 23:48:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,324
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22824367
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/missditsydarcy/pseuds/missditsydarcy
Summary: Then, it finally seems like the moment had come, and his doctor gives him the nod that lets him know that he’s in the home-stretch, that this is his last push and that he should make it count—so Rin takes in a deep breath and focuses all his might, all his anxieties, and all the struggles of pregnancy, and focuses it all in on that pressure spot and pushes like he had never before.He’s exerting to the point he’s getting white spots in his vision, seeing stars, and he’s unsure how to articulate the sound that comes out of his body whilst he’s doing so until the room seems to grow deathly still, the nurses gasping happily, and then Rin and Sousuke following in suit as their lives change forever, right in front of their eyes as their baby is placed onto Rin’s chest.“Happy Birthday, little girl!” one of the nurses says gleefully, another loud gasp and then sob emitting from the new father as Rin struggles with the notion that he’s unable to wrap his arms immediately around this baby, his baby, because the nurses are busy working on helping her to breathe.
Relationships: Matsuoka Rin/Yamazaki Sousuke
Series: "Autumn Child" Verse OneShots [5]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/942660
Comments: 6
Kudos: 37





	Labor and Delivery (PT:2)

**Author's Note:**

> Aaah! I've honestly been waiting for this part for such a long time, but then I was kind of stuck a little while writing it.   
> I feel like some of the characterizations were off--and for that I apologize if it happens to be true.   
> Anyways! I hope you enjoy it! The next part will hopefully be up soon! :)

Throughout Rin’s pregnancy he realizes only now that he hasn’t put much thought into the actual process of delivering a baby—so it’s easy for one to imagine the incredulous conversations he and his husband Sousuke had when the doctor had made her leave after checking her patient’s progress for the first time since he had been admitted.

“I don’t understand,” Rin huffs, crossing his arms as he leans back into his hospital bed. He makes a whining noise and then strokes his hand over his swollen belly that’s currently all patched up with the appropriate monitors to keep track of the man’s contractions as well as how the baby’s heartbeat is responding to the added pressure of these very real labor pains. “I swore I was ready that time.”

“I’m sure it will be soon,” Sousuke amends, sitting in his seat beside Rin’s bed, hand resting on his husband’s lower arm a moment before connecting their hands and giving it a squeeze of confidence and support. “Makoto said that instinct is really heightened when it’s the real thing.”

“Shut up about _Makoto_ already _,_ and how he had his twins because obviously it was way different than this!” Rin groans, pulling his hands away to cover his face in frustration. Then he forces himself to take in a deep breath and leans back against his bed, allowing his hands to fall to his sides before he turns his attention back to his husband with an apologetic look on his face. “I’m sorry, there’s just...a lot going on right now. We don’t have a name for our baby, and she wasn’t supposed to come until the new year—I know she’ll still be fine, but it’s a lot no matter how you look at it.”

“I know,” Sousuke says after a minute, almost waiting to see if Rin was done with his speech before he speaks up once again. “I think you’re handling it well—better than I had expected, actually.”

Rin doesn’t know why but he starts laughing, like a full-on belly laugh that abates quickly as he feels his stomach tighten to prepare for another contraction.

“That’s...fair,” he grunts, pushing his fists into the mattress as his face contorts in pain, beginning the breathing exercises that his nurse had instructed him when Sousuke was out parking the car and Rin had just started a contraction.

“That’s it, Rin,” Sousuke croons once he snaps back into attention, seeing his beloved in pain once more and knowing that this is one of his most important parts of the job, finally feeling like there was something he could do for Rin that he excelled at; being there and being supportive, calming him down when he’s in one of those moods he gets in. A part of him wonders if their daughter will be like that, while he offers his hand for Rin to squeeze as he works through the current pain. “Just keep breathing.”

“God, it hurts,” Rin whines, curling up slightly and leaning more towards his husband as the pain continually seems to escalate—trying to keep breathing even though it seems to accentuate and alleviate the pain all the same. “It hurts so much...”

“I know,” Sousuke croons, furrowing his brow as he suddenly realizes that comforting physical ailments were practically alien compared to talking him down when he’s riled up, emotionally. “Just think, it will all be over soon, and then we’ll finally have our baby...”

“S-she’s almost here,” Rin practices as his hands involuntary curl into Sousuke’s shirt, his ball of courage, as he continues to take deep breaths. He feels wetness in his face, around his eyes but he can’t tell, and frankly, doesn’t care at this point if it’s wetness from tears or from sweat. “Well, it better be soon, I can’t take much more of this, Sousuke. I—aah, can’t, I’ll die...”

Sousuke closes his eyes, humming nonchalantly at Rin’s melodramas, while all the same not wanting to discount the pain that he must be in; after all, Sousuke can only merely speculate what’s going on in his husband’s body right now, expelling an actual human being of all things. He cocks his head a bit, leaning down to rest their heads together as Rin’s now-usual bouts of humming begins as the contraction starts to wind down; and he gives Rin’s hand another squeeze of encouragement while the pregnant man seems to be involuntarily nuzzling even closer to him.

“You won’t die,” Sousuke says, near breathlessly, as he realizes that he must have been holding his breath too for a moment before Rin slumps against him, his body still straining as the pain leaves his body for a few minutes. He strokes his husband’s damp hair before he engulfs Rin in his arms as the aforementioned begins to cry, curling closer to the other heat source while Sousuke’s free hand inches over to rub Rin’s belly to help calm their baby girl as well. “If anyone can do this it’s you.”

Rin takes in a sharp breath, hand coming to rest over Sousuke’s hand on his stomach as he begins to bawl all over again—wiping his snot and tears on the other man’s shirt as he buries his face in Sousuke’s chest before his chin is brought up to level with the most beautiful turquoise eyes. Their their lips are connected and Rin whines, sighing blissfully as he rests there for a moment before allowing himself to fall back into the mattress once more.

“I feel gross,” he says, then, chuckling a little while his hands stroke his belly and he gazes at Sousuke adoringly. “Can you grab my hair tie? I know it won’t pull back all my hair, but any improvement at this point is completely necessary.”

Sousuke just nods and reaches into their suitcase and returns to Rin’s beside dutifully, where he brushes back his husband’s hair and then pulls it into a loose nub of a ponytail that rests near his lower hairline. Rin hums pleasurably and leans back, closing his eyes while Sousuke puts back the brush and then walks over to the small sink in the room where he finds a washcloth that a nurse had brought in when Rin had first arrived that he had initially refused—bringing it back over with him and laying it over the other man’s forehead.

“I…don’t get it,” Rin slurs, humming pleasurably once more as he feels the welcomed cool dampness on his skin that wasn’t of his own origin, folding his arms over it on his forehead like it could enable him to sap up even more of this admittedly odd luxury. “I feel totally ready, like, totally ready—but why won’t they just let me push now? It’s gotta be wide enough by now. It’s early, I’m sure she’s really…small—why can’t I get the show on the road already?”

“You need to reach ten centimeters before the baby can come,” Sousuke says rather lazily, fingers trailing along the skin of Rin’s forearm, chuckling a bit as he notices his husband shiver from the contact. “You have six more to go; no matter how small she may be, four centimeters won’t cut it.”

Rin scrunches up his face a little, but he’s still enjoying the cool from the washcloth enough not to be immediately perturbed by this news—so instead he just takes in a deep breath and grabs the washcloth, using it to rub the excess heat off of his neck and up his arms before leaning forward a little and then finally resting it behind his neck like a collar.

“But, isn’t four centimeters like,” Rin pauses, holding his hands up in front of him and framing them like so to illustrate an opening that he thinks should be big enough for a baby’s body to go through. “That’s so enough; do doctor’s like to see their patients in pain? There’s something not right about that…”

“More like this,” Sousuke says lightly, taking his husband’s hands and closing them to a more appropriate measurement of four centimeters, then immediately moving back so that he may not be the object of abuse when Rin decides to respond in a manner that is much more like himself.

“Oh,” Rin says, his tone and expression falling as his hands land harshly back down to the mattress again, seemingly completely deflated in a way that almost makes Sousuke wish that he could actually do something to make Rin’s wish a reality. “Guess that’s why the doc was asking me if I wanted to start thinking about an epidural, yeah?”

“And how do you feel about it?” Sousuke asks, attentively, hands on his knees like he was prepared to go fetch a nurse to find and anesthesiologist on the ready should Rin decide to take that route. He already knew he was leaving it up to his husband, completely.

“I mean…it’s bad, and I mean… _bad_ ; but…I dunno, I sort of feel like using it would be like admitting…defeat, or something.”

“Defeat to _what_?” Sousuke asks, slightly taken aback as he had almost completely resolved to Rin’s answer being something akin to an agreement. “It’s a nerve-blocker, Rin; not some street drug that will eliminate your ability to be…sober enough to actually experience this.”

“Yeah but…won’t I be…bedridden for a while?”

“Only until after everything’s over.”

“I don’t like that,” Rin admits. “Not that I can really move that much now…but…I don’t want that opportunity to be removed completely in case I want to be able to use it later.”

Sousuke chuckles, realizing that it’s his way of trying to maintain any sort of self-control through this experience—of course he just nods, sticking by his word that he will leave it completely up to Rin.

“That sounds like you,” Sousuke croons, leaning forward to give his husband a kiss on the forehead before he resettles back into his seat. It seems they’re in for a bit of a long-haul today. “So that’s what it will be.”

* * *

“Aaaah, screw this! I need an epidural…and I need it now!” Rin seethes, doubling over as he’s leaning on Sousuke, practically hanging off of him as his most recent contraction reaches its climax. “It hurts so bad—agh!”

Sousuke continues to resume his role of applying pressure to his husband’s hips, being leverage as Rin continues to work through the pain. It had been six hours since they had checked in, and at almost ten o’clock at night he was beginning to really truly feel worse and worse for the one who was actually going through all of this. He wasn’t sure at this point which way was up and which was down, he was tired and could only imagine how Rin must feel with contractions that were still going strong at around three minutes apart, but had intensified since his doctor had come in and broke Rin’s water to try and get things moving about two hours ago. Sousuke knows that Rin had just said something but it takes a moment for the words to comprehend in his mind—and he nods as he helps to lower his husband’s bottom to the towel covered birthing ball, moving Rin’s arms to the mattress beside them to help keep him steady while he goes to find a nurse who could help them.

By the time he reaches the door, however, Rin’s doctor surfaces, and she peers around the weary parent-to-be to her patient who is leaning over and moaning loudly into the mattress underneath his face as he tries his hardest to keep breathing like he had been told.

“I say it sounds like a good time to see where we’re at, eh?” she says cheerfully as Sousuke steps to the side and she glides into the room, smoothly applying hand sanitizer before covering her hands in gloves as she makes her way to her patient. “If you could do me a favor Mr. Yamazaki-san and please help Rin-san to stand for a moment so I can check how dilated we are, that would be much appreciated…”

Sousuke nods and does as he’s been asked, holding Rin firmly up at the hips while the doctor peers in below, humming nonchalantly and then nodding as she steps back and decisively throws her gloves into a nearby trash can.

“Do you have a name picked out yet?” she asks, though it’s plain to see that this question was proposed with an ulterior motive.

“N-not quite,” Rin croaks, hands splayed out on the mattress as his head rests between them while he waits for the pain to return. “But we…haven’t really had the time to work on that…”

“It’s okay,” she amends, clapping her hands together for a minute before beginning to walk towards the door. “A baby doesn’t have to come out with a name already set in stone; and you’ll definitely have some time to chat about it once baby arrives.”

“Y-yeah,” Rin says lazily, but then he lifts his head up to catch her walking towards the door—and immediately his mouth is hanging open, ready to spout words as he knows that he can’t be skipping a beat at this point in order to get what he needs. “I changed my mind; I want the epidural.”

“Sorry,” she chuckles, tapping her knuckle on the doorframe as she then begins to make her official leave. “Can’t give epidurals just for delivery—and _you’re_ all ready to push.”

“Wh—” Rin sputters, looking at his husband with wide eyes before he turns like he’s planning on going running after her. Sousuke is immediately at his side and then helps him to stand as nurses flutter in and ask Rin to get back into bed for transport, which the two gladly acquiesce even as the anxieties flourish within their beings.

“I’m not ready for this,” Rin cries as his bed is locked in place once more in a different room with an incubator completely furnished with a blanket and hat ready for a baby to fill the void, instruments strewn on a table as well as many spotlights in addition to the monitors that Rin is already quite acquainted with. He shakes his head even as Sousuke pulls him closer and gives him a kiss on his forehead as their doctor greets them once more.

“Long time no see,” the doctor jokes as she steps easily into her surgical covering, nurses tying it behind her and fastening her gloves and surgical mask before she sits upon her stool at the business end while some other nurses position Rin’s legs in the stirrups and instructs him to slip down just a little on the bed. “Let’s have a baby, shall we?”

“N—I…I have no idea what I’m doing,” Rin admits weakly, desperately, as he leans forward just a little like he’s unsure whether she can hear him with all the commotion around. He feels his cheeks reddening but it might also be in combination with how hot and embarrassed he suddenly feels, like he’s on display at a museum as the first and only male in the maternity wing on this blizzardly fall night in December. “What am I supposed to do?”

“It’s okay, Rin-san, I’m here with you, we’re all here with you and we’ll make sure to tell you exactly what’s going on and how to do this,” his doctor says in a soothing but professional tone. She reaches out and splays her hand on his distended belly as the nurses are pulling up Rin’s gown and placing all the monitors on his stomach once more. “Once your next contraction starts, I’m going to have you start pushing like you’re trying to go to the bathroom. We’ll try that a few times and more than likely I’ll have you pant for a bit until the baby’s head is crowning, and then I’ll have you push again with higher intensity.

“Then when the head has been delivered you can have a little rest while we turn the baby and try and clean her airways a bit before you deliver the shoulders as well. After that I’ll be assisting you with pulling the baby out the rest of the way, and then you meet your little baby before the placenta comes along…”

By this time Rin is sort of just gaping at her, unsure of what exactly he’s supposed to say at this point, but Sousuke is in the right sort of mind to nod and then he’s grabbing Rin’s hand as the pregnant one suddenly cringes and then sobs as his next contraction begins to arise.

“Alright Rin-san, let’s get going your baby needs you to push now!” a nurse who is now at his left side, holding his left leg back whilst another nurse holds his right, says in a light and encouraging tone. Sousuke squeezes his hand all while Rin is painstakingly resisting nearly every advance no matter how pure all of their intentions were.

“No, no, no,” Rin keeps reciting, then he grunts and moans—trying to take as deep breaths as he can just as a new kind of pain rips through his middle, and he lets out a scream, panting for all he’s worth until he notices that his doctor is looking right at him. He nearly stops breathing when he notices that her eyes are near pleading through his guttural reply. “I can’t do this…”

“How would you know if you don’t try?” she asks, not skipping a beat nor sounding like Rin’s reaction has thrown her in any sort of way. “C’mon, now, Rin-san, give me a good push, push my finger down—no one can do this but you, and yes, it’s going to be hard but, in the end, it will be so worth it.”

Rin, now panting once more, looks towards his husband with glazed eyes, shaky sobs emitting from his mouth as he watches Sousuke nod, and lean forward to give him a kiss on the lips, cheeks, and forehead, for strength—but, instead of letting Sousuke back away again Rin holds fast, cupping Sousuke’s cheeks on either side and connecting their foreheads before he takes in a deep breath, and bears down for the first of many times.

“Good, good, that’s great, Rin-san—find your focal point, and keep pushing!” the nurse on the left side chants, her grip tightening around Rin’s ankle for a moment as if it’s a squeeze of encouragement, whilst the nurse on the other side continues to count from one to ten.

Once she reaches ten, Rin’s doctor immediately instructs him to take a breath and then go for it again—Rin hesitates for a moment before Sousuke presses his forehead towards Rin’s with just a little more pressure that signals for him to not pay attention to that, to look right at him and just do what he’s told. Almost uncharacteristically, Rin whines and then does as he’s told, a low grunt emitting from the aforementioned until the count reaches that ten second mark, and he falls back into the mattress with the scent and sounds of exertion, his eyes closing while he crosses his arms over his forehead once more, trying to catch his breath.

“Those were _great,_ Rin-san, you’re doing very well; just rest for a few moments until the next contraction comes and then we’re going to pant and see which one brings baby down faster, alright? We’re going to try to be as efficient as possible since I know you’ve had a long day…”

Rin doesn’t dignify this with a response but Sousuke knows that if he were to that it would encompass some sort of gratitude for his doctor’s consideration—so he nods for Rin instead, and then begins to press a cold compress on Rin’s sweat stained skin while the other man sighs against the coolness as he enjoys the remainder of his brief break.

It’s brief by textbook definition, though, much to Rin’s dismay as everyone watches the patient’s body tense with the precursors of the next labor pain—and his doctor really doesn’t skip a beat, immediately jumping up and applying pressure to the top curve of Rin’s abdomen to try and guide the baby down further as she gives her patient the proper instructions, while the nurses hold Rin’s legs up again.

“Okay, just keep breathing, Rin-san, you don’t need to push right now just give me some deep breaths,” she pauses while she mimics the sounds that she wants to be hearing. “That’s it, just let your body push the baby down; very good…”

Rin starts as he begins to feel a new sensation, a strange burning in such a region and a pressure like no other—he lets out a small shout, biting his lip, hard, as he tries to listen to his doctor even though it almost feels as if his body is telling him to do something else.

“I need to push,” he finds himself saying moments later, giving his doctor a fierce look as he’s shot by a look of smiling eyes on the other side, almost as though everyone knows something that he doesn’t. “Oh God, I think I’m doing it, I can’t stop—I need to push—”

One of the nurses smiles as she peers at the place in question and then the doctor returns to her seat on the stool, her hands able and ready as she turns her complete attention to her patient for a moment, giving him a decisive nod.

“Well then, I guess we need to listen to your body; go on, I think we can get one, maybe two good pushes out of this contraction.”

Rin takes in a deep breath, nodding as Sousuke wraps their hands together—a newfound fire in his eyes as he focuses his everything on the final prize, no matter how fluid the ending seems to be now. He bears down, leaning forward just slightly as he grunts, groans, and shouts his way to his daughter’s first breath.

* * *

It took Rin around forty-five minutes to deliver the head, which, as the nurses had explained while the doctor was doing her work and he was taking a break, was a feat that not many first-time parents could claim. Sure, he had an oxygen mask on standby, that he had used on occasion, but overall, he would be lying if he said he wasn’t proud of the progress that he’s made—or _how_ the progress had been made when it’s considered that he didn’t do it in any conventional way. Just…the way that worked for him.

By now he feels as though he’s the expert at listening to his body, and it seems as though he’s not afraid to tell anyone who doubts that, what for—including Sousuke who had told him to take a breather, to which Rin about snarled and seethed the words _‘Bite me’_ instead of articulating it in an appropriate way.

On another note, he’s almost never felt more powerful and more in control in his life, and it’s oddly exhilarating to say the least—but it would be a lie for him to say that it was without extreme pain and some thousand tears shed along the way, but he’s okay with that.

He’s breathing deeply and resting, though there’s a thought in the back of his mind about how close to the end that he is, and he wonders exactly why the hell he would have to stop until he overhears the doctor murmuring something about the umbilical cord which puts Rin right back in his place. Sure, he can listen to his body—but the doctor probably had a better idea of what was right for his baby at the moment. He would let her have this one, but it would be the last!

Then, it finally seems like the moment had come, and his doctor gives him the nod that lets him know that he’s in the home-stretch, that this is his last push and that he should make it count—so Rin takes in a deep breath and focuses all his might, all his anxieties, and all the struggles of pregnancy, and focuses it all in on that pressure spot and pushes like he had never before.

He’s exerting to the point he’s getting white spots in his vision, seeing stars, and he’s unsure how to articulate the sound that comes out of his body whilst he’s doing so until the room seems to grow deathly still, the nurses gasping happily, and then Rin and Sousuke following in suit as their lives change forever, right in front of their eyes as their baby is placed onto Rin’s chest.

“Happy Birthday, little girl!” one of the nurses says gleefully, another loud gasp and then sob emitting from the new father as Rin struggles with the notion that he’s unable to wrap his arms immediately around this baby, his baby, because the nurses are busy working on helping her to breathe.

She doesn’t cry immediately, but rather seems to wait until the nurses are starting to massage the goop off her body, which she decides to loudly protest—causing many to croon over how much she had been through in one day, and that they understood, she’s so precious, and cute, among other pleasantries.

Rin finds himself looking briefly over at his husband, sobs still pouring out of him as he takes his free hand and reaches out for Sousuke, taking his love’s hand and then placing it on the back of the newest edition to the room as she continues to practice using those new lungs of hers. Her father’s kiss, long and hard, a few times, before both of them turn their attention very closely to their bundle of joy—knowing that this will last only a moment before she’s swept away for the Apgar test that is performed on every newborn minutes after they arrive.

“Ssssssshhhhhh, hello sweet girl, my Aii—chan,” Rin croons softly, sniffling as he peppers the baby’s head with kisses over a few times before he looks briefly over at Sousuke who seems to be articulating exactly what to say as his first words to his daughter. “That’s your Papa, Sousuke, Aki, and you know what, he loves you so much. And I love you so much…”

“She’ll recognize your voice,” a nurse pipes up all of a sudden, looking directly at Sousuke who still seems like he’s trying out his parental sea-legs, before she peers back at their workspace as they prep to cut the umbilical cord. “Try talking to her, she’ll probably calm down.”

Sousuke notices that since Rin had spoken up, their baby seems to have calmed down significantly, and his mouth spreads into a wide smile as he can already see the bond between these two that doesn’t surprise him in the least. Rin’s always been good at making friends and speaking out, thus he’ll obviously have no problem making a fool of himself when he’s all spread out in the delivery room with a newborn on his chest—that’s just how Rin is, and it’s one of the things that Sousuke loves the most about him, that he simultaneously despises. Rin almost seems to make him more human, more… _personable_ , and there’s literally no one else in the world that he would have wanted to have a baby with than the one right in front of him. Perhaps they’ll have a more personable moment later when the room is quieter and when Rin isn’t around to cry his eyes out over watching the bond between the two people he loves most in the world, flourish—but he supposes that in light of all the things that have happened today that at the very least he owes Rin and his daughter a valiant effort regardless of how he feels.

He takes a moment to really look at her; dark hair, and plenty of it. She has a button nose much like that of Rin’s, and her perfect ten fingers and toes are flexing as they please, responding perfectly to almost any sort of touch. There didn’t appear to be anything imperfect about her and that of itself, though this may be heavily sponsored by the fact that she is his daughter, is enough to inspire a tear or two to trail down his cheeks. Of course, he quickly wipes them away so he wouldn’t be caught by the ever-observant patient who is most likely making quite the same observations about the infant in his arms, that Sousuke is making right now.

Sousuke hears the doctor ask him if he would like to cut the cord, and, in quite a haze, he’s nodding as they guide his hand to the correct spot, and he’s clamping down with fear in his eyes and quaking in his fingers; and almost as if the child can feel or understand her father’s apprehension, she begins to whimper again, and it escalates into a reedy wail until one of the nurses scoops her up and then places her in Sousuke’s arms for a few moments. He coyly reaches out a finger, stroking the cheek of his daughter and placing a kiss on her head before speaking in a tone that he hadn’t known could be articulated as his heart melts and then fiercely seems to regenerate more than three times it’s size all in one minute, gazing upon this perfect girl, this human that he had… _made_ with the love of his life.

Even through the blanket he could feel her body heat and it seems she can feel his as well—she settles slightly closer to him and he has to swallow back the tears that seem to collect in the back of his throat as her palm reaches out and brushes against his chest before she resettles—only to begin making a whining noise moments afterwards, perhaps being well too in tune to the apprehension that he suddenly begins to feel as he imagines her being anything other than what she is now, knowing that even at this moment she’s already starting to grow up. He wouldn’t dare talk to Rin about that at this point; so, for now he decides to try his best to live in the moment and to officially commit to those first words that his daughter will hear on this side of the world—

“You know, I don’t think you’re the only one in the family with a thing for dramatics,” he says softly, bouncing her just the slightest in his arms while he looks Rin straight in the eyes as he jests, and then leans forward to give his husband a kiss on the forehead before he begins to walk towards the incubator with his daughter in tow so they can perform that essential newborn tests—his physique melting as he watches her yawn in his arms, and then squirm as she feels the new sensation of the incubator plastic beneath her comfortable blanket. He takes his pinky finger and then allows her hand to grasp on to it so she can be sure to know that he’s still there while she’s poked and prodded for the very first time as he begins to elaborate on his own brand of teasing that’s just as much for himself and Rin as it is for the little girl who is yet to officially be named.

Of course, there’s something oddly alluring to him about the concept of ‘ _Aki_ ’, or “ _Aii-chan_ ” as Rin had put it just moments ago. He decides that perhaps he’ll take it out for a spin to see if the name would be acceptable—

“ _Everything’s alright; it’s just an autumn snow storm, Akiko_.”

**Author's Note:**

> feel free to follow me on tumblr: www.l1nkp1t.tumblr.com!


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